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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23905084">A Flat Tire on the Way to the Stars</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeiaMatias/pseuds/DeiaMatias'>DeiaMatias</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Lucifer (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, Stargazing, Stranded</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 18:21:14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,495</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23905084</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeiaMatias/pseuds/DeiaMatias</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Set one week after the events of 4x05. Chloe and Lucifer go to interrogate a suspect living in the California desert. Technical difficulties delay their return, giving them the opprotunity to regain some of their spark so that they can begin to find their new normal</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>37</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>211</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Flat Tire on the Way to the Stars</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I should have been writing angst this evening, but I had a fairly miserable and angsty day. I still wanted to write, but wanted something light and fun. We've been teaching our kids astronomy, ancient history, and mythology during quarantine. This was inspired by those lessons.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Shoshone, California was a map dot three and a half hours outside of Los Angeles on the edge of Death Valley. And that was where the ex-husband of their victim called home.</p><p>The interview was a bust and his alibi checked out, so Chloe and Lucifer pulled out of the town in dejected spirits.</p><p>It had been three months since Chloe learned that the man next to her wasn't delusional. It had been two months since she'd returned home from Rome, and it had been one week since the bombing at Lux. </p><p>Things were still… weird between them. Not bad, necessarily, but weird. Awkward. They spent a lot of time not talking about anything supernatural, and since Lucifer had uttered some form of the words "I'm the Devil" about every 15 minutes for as long as she'd known him, his attempts to act <em> normal </em> were anything but.</p><p>They'd had a moment that morning where it came up in conversation for the first time in days. They walked out of the precinct towards her car, Chloe grumbling about their drive to nowhere. Lucifer stopped at the passenger side of her door, looking at her expectantly, waiting for her to finish her rant. </p><p>"Are you going to unlock the car, Detective? It's getting a bit warm out here."</p><p>"Why don't you just open the door like you have a thousand times before?"</p><p>Lucifer shifted uncomfortably. "I thought that I would refrain from tapping into my… unusual gifts in your presence for the time being."</p><p>Chloe blinked twice. "That's a… devil thing? I always just figured you had a key fob for my car."</p><p>Lucifer perked up. "I'm good at getting things to open up for me, Detective," he said with a grin.</p><p>Chloe rolled her eyes and fought back a little smile. <em> That's more like it, </em>she thought. She pulled out her keys and pushed the unlock button.</p><p>"Next time, just open the door, Lucifer," she said, getting behind the wheel.</p><p>"Really?"</p><p>She nodded. "And don't hold back your desire shtick during this interview just because you're worried about how I'll react."</p><p>Lucifer grinned, "Yes, ma'am." </p><p>When it came time for him to use his mojo on the suspect, though, Chloe found herself watching him more than the suspect. She hoped that he didn't notice.</p><p>And now, here she was, leaving a one horse town on the edge of Death Valley. The sun had just set, and she had the Devil riding shotgun.</p><p>They were 10 miles outside of town when it happened. There was a bang, and the car jerked hard to the left. Chloe fought to regain control of the car, and managed to bring it to a stop, inches from going off the tarmac into the dust of the California desert.</p><p>She sat with her hands clenched around the wheel for a solid minute, trying to bring her heart rate down. "Are… are you okay, Lucifer?"</p><p>"I'm fine, Detective. Are you okay?"</p><p>Chloe nodded and unglued her hands from the steering wheel. She opened her door and turned to examine the front of her car. Lucifer got out to stand beside her. "Flat tire."</p><p>"Yup," she said. She popped the trunk and began pulling out supplies. Then she realized that they had a problem.</p><p>"Where's my jack?" she rummaged around in the trunk, but it was useless. The jack was gone. Suddenly she leaned against the car in defeat. "I lent it to Dan last week. He didn't return it."</p><p>"Blame the douche. I like it."</p><p>"Very funny." She reached into her pocket for her phone. "We can always call AAA."</p><p>Lucifer pulled out his own phone. "Do you have a signal? I don't."</p><p>"Nope."</p><p>Great. And now she was stranded in the middle of nowhere with no car and no phone. With the Devil.</p><p>"This feels like the beginning of a horror movie," she muttered under her breath. Which, of course, he heard.</p><p>"Or a very strange porno." She looked over at him. He was trying to look amused, but she saw the hurt in his eyes. </p><p>"I didn't mean it like that, Lucifer, I promise." He still wouldn't meet her eyes. She walked over to him and put a hand on his arm. "Really. I know you won't let me get eaten by coyotes or killed by weirdos roaming the desert with knives."</p><p>He looked down at her hand, a small smile turning up the corner of his lips. "I'll take care of the wild animals, you shoot the knife-wielding maniacs."</p><p>"Deal," she said with a smile.</p><p>Lucifer brightened at that. "Detective! Congratulations! You made a…"</p><p>"... deal with the Devil. I know." She smiled up at him. "I knew you'd make a thing about it the second it left my mouth."</p><p>He grinned. "Well, you've got your guardian Devil along with you on this trip, so let's get this tire fixed."</p><p>"Do you have some kind of tire-fixing superpower?"</p><p>"No, don't be ridiculous." He bent down beside the busted tired, felt under the car for the jack point, and effortlessly lifted the front end of the car a few inches off the ground.</p><p>Chloe felt her jaw drop.</p><p>Lucifer looked at her, slightly amused. "Doing okay, Detective?"</p><p>She stared at him a second longer before snapping her jaw shut. "Yeah, yeah. I'm good." She tightened her grip on the tire iron and knelt next to Lucifer. Chloe positioned the tire iron over the first lug nut and stood. As she put one foot on the iron, she looked at him, skeptically. "Can you hold my weight too?"</p><p>Lucifer just shot her a look that plainly said <em> Of course. </em></p><p>Chloe braced herself on the hood of her car and put both feet on the tire iron. "Whatever are you doing, Detective?"</p><p>"Loosening the lug nuts."</p><p>"With your feet?"</p><p>"I can't unscrew them. They're too tight. So you just bounce on the tire iron…" she bounced until it came loose, "...and there you go!"</p><p>"Get down before you hurt yourself." He pushed at her ankle. She got down and knelt beside him again. </p><p>"How do you propose we do it, then?"</p><p>Lucifer grinned at her, waiving his fingers. </p><p>"Seriously?"</p><p>He reached down and removed the lug nuts one at a time with his bare hands. "I have very talented fingers, Detective."</p><p>"So I've heard," she replied, dryly.</p><p>"You get to carry the tire. I don't want to get my suit dirty."</p><p>Chloe shook her head. "You're ridiculous." She walked to the back of the car and hauled the tire out, rolling it to sit next to the blown tire. "Loosen that one up for me."</p><p>"It's dirty!"</p><p>"Don’t be a baby," she grumbled, pulled the old tire off the axle and put the new one on. "That was heavy," she said, standing to stretch the muscles in her back, throwing her head back.</p><p>"I hold up a car, you complain about a little tire."</p><p>Lucifer continued to complain about the dirt on the lugnuts, her car, the road… but Chloe wasn't paying attention anymore.</p><p>"Lucifer!" she gasped in a reverent whisper. "Look up! They're beautiful!"</p><p>Above her head, thousands of twinkling stars glistened in the sky. The haze of the Milky Way was even visible. She hadn't seen that many stars since she was a child.</p><p>"Thank you," he said, reaching for another lugnut.</p><p>"Hmm?" she said, looking back down at him.</p><p>"I made them." Lucifer tightened the lugnut, not looking at Chloe.</p><p>"Made what?" </p><p>"The stars."</p><p>Chloe blinked down at him. "Seriously?"</p><p>"When my father said, 'let there be light,' he said it to me."</p><p>"So that includes the sun?"</p><p>"The sun is a star." </p><p>Chloe watched as Lucifer stood. He kept his distance from her. "The Lightbringer," she said in a whisper.</p><p>Lucifer nodded. He went to shove his hands in his pockets and stopped, looking at the road dirt on his hands. His nose crinkled in disgust. "Do you have any napkins? And some water?"</p><p>Chloe laughed, the spell broken. "I can do even better than that." She reached into her trunk and pulled out a package of wet wipes, tossing them to him. Her fingers paused on another item in her trunk in thought.</p><p>"Thank you, Detective. Your car is truly filthy."</p><p>Chloe ignored him, grabbing the item from her trunk. She held it before him, a smile on her face.</p><p>"What's that?"</p><p>"A blanket."</p><p>"I gathered that. What's it for?" He looked lost.</p><p>She walked back over to him and put a hand on his arm. "Will you go stargazing with me, Lucifer?" Chloe didn't wait for a reply, dragging him out into the desert. She laid the blanket down on the ground and sat. She held her hand out to him. "Sit with me?"</p><p>"On that? It's hideous."</p><p>"Don't knock it. My daughter was conceived on this blanket."</p><p>"You want me to lay down on Douche Juice?"</p><p>Chole laughed. "I've washed it since then. Come on, Lucifer. You're already dirty." She laid back, her hands behind her head, gazing up at Lucifer's stars.</p><p>Lucifer gave a sigh and sat down beside her. </p><p>"Lay down."</p><p>He didn't sigh this time, but he seemed very cautious as he laid down beside her.</p><p>"Happy now, Detective?"</p><p>"Very. Thank you."</p><p>They sat in silence for a moment, simply looking up. "Did you name them?" Chloe said, quietly.</p><p>"No. Humans did that all on their own. Do you know their names?"</p><p>"Some of them," Chloe said thoughtfully. She pointed up to her left. "That's Orion."</p><p>"See that reddish one in his shoulder?" Lucifer turned over on his side, pointing up. "That's Betelgeuse."</p><p>"If you say it's name three times, does Michael Keaton appear?"</p><p>"No, now hush. I'm trying to teach you something. Humans call it a red supergiant. Basically that means that I gave it a little extra oomph to make it bigger and brighter. But the big ones don't live as long. Betelgeuse will disappear from the sky soon." Lucifer sounded a bit sad at that.</p><p>"How soon?"</p><p>He shrugged "10,000 years, give or take a few centuries.</p><p>"That's soon?"</p><p>"Soon to me."</p><p>Chloe leaned up on her elbow, looking down at him. "What is a human lifespan to you, Lucifer?"</p><p>He looked at her, stunned for a moment by the beauty of the starlight in her hair. "A blink of an eye and an eternity. Both. At the same time." He touched one finger to the side of her face, brushing her hair back. Chloe closed her eyes and leaned into his touch. He took his hand back and coughed. "Apologies, Detective," he said, and laid back, looking at the sky above him.</p><p>Chloe studied his face for a moment, gave a small sigh of disappointment and laid back down beside him. "What's that one?" she asked, pointing to a bright star on the western horizon.</p><p>"That's not a star, it's a planet. It's Venus."</p><p>"It's beautiful."</p><p>"Sometime in the 13th century or so, humans started calling it Venus after the Roman goddess of love and beauty. They said it was the most beautiful star in the sky. But the Romans themselves had a different name for it."</p><p>"What did the Romans call it?"</p><p>"Depending on the rotation of the planets, sometimes Venus appears in the evening sky, just after sunset, and sometimes it appears in the morning, just before dawn. The Romans thought they were two different stars. They called the evening version Vesper."</p><p>"What did they call it in the morning?"</p><p>"Lucifer."</p><p>Chloe turned her head towards him. "Really?"</p><p>He nodded.</p><p>"You were named after Venus?"</p><p>He looked slightly offended. "Venus was named after me. My story was around, even then. Although thankfully without all that garbage you dug up in Rome."</p><p>Chloe gave a sad, guilty sigh and turned her head back to the sky.</p><p>Lucifer turned towards her. "I'm sorry, Detective. I didn't mean to upset you."</p><p>"You don't have anything to apologize for, Lucifer."</p><p>He reached his hand over bringing her face towards his. "Really, Detective. I'm sorry." She held his gaze for a minute and smiled. </p><p>"So why did the Romans name Venus for you?"</p><p>"The most beautiful star in the sky? Appears to fall? Isn't it obvious?"</p><p>Chloe laughed then. "Nice that your ego has remained the same throughout history."</p><p>Lucifer smiled and leaned back. "In Latin, the words for 'Light Bringer' and 'Morning Star' were the same: Lucifer. They knew that Venus' appearance in the morning sky heralded the dawn, and they knew I was the one who hung the stars from the sky. That word, my name, came from an earlier language, of course."</p><p>"So, your legal name, Lucifer Morningstar, is actually redundant?"</p><p>Lucifer laughed then. "You humans, so pesky about things like last names on official documents. Yes, it's redundant. Although, I suppose if you wanted to be correct about it, my name would be Lucifer THE Morning Star." He gave her a grin. "You may refer to me as such, mortal."</p><p>Chloe laughed. "Fat chance."</p><p>A breeze ran across the desert. Chloe gave a little shiver and subconsciously leaned into the warmth of his body. Lucifer closed his eyes, allowing himself to enjoy her body beside his.</p><p>"Thank you," she whispered.</p><p>"For what?"</p><p>"For allowing me back into your life. For stargazing with me."</p><p>He removed a hand from behind his head, wrapping it around her shoulders. "You're welcome, Detective. It's been my pleasure." She curled in tighter to him.</p><p>And suddenly a thought washed through him, like being soaked by cold water.</p><p>Eve. Eve was waiting on him while he held another in his arms.</p><p>He gave a sigh and removed his arm, standing up. "Let's get back to the city, Detective." He held out his hand to her.</p><p>Chloe looked at him, and Lucifer felt, at that moment, that she knew exactly what he was thinking. She gave him a sad little smile and took his hand, allowing him to pull her to her feet.</p><p>Their eyes held for a moment, both wanting. But, considering their history, it was inevitable that one of them would chicken out.</p><p>"You know," Chloe said, giving a little laugh, "Trixie would love to go stargazing with you sometime. She'd love to hear your stories."</p><p>"Laying in the dirt <em> and </em>the urchin's sticky fingers? I don't think that I would live through it." </p><p>Chloe laughed at his expense. "Seriously, Lucifer, how did you ever survive in the days before indoor plumbing?" She tugged him towards the car.</p><p>"It was awful, Detective. People would go months without bathing. Intimate moments were constantly surrounded by an odor."</p><p>"Bet that didn't slow you down, though."</p><p>"Of course not! Let me tell you about this lovely peasant girl I met on the outskirts of Paris. She had legs for miles. Hairy, of course, but that never bothered me."</p><p>Chloe laughed. "Get in the car, Lucifer."</p><p>"She did this thing with a turnip and hot candle wax…"</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I did take certain liberties in the Latin translation of the word "Lucifer" for the sake of brevity.... because, honestly, no one wants to read me drabbling on about dead languages for pages on end... but I would *really* enjoy writing it. I also mushed real history around just a bit to make it fit with the canon of Lucifer. But 95% of the things that Lucifer tells Chloe are true.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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